Science News editors and writers survey the top news from the world of science in 2008. The selected stories are featured in this year-end issue, with links to the original, longer stories.

Science News writers and editors looked back at the past year's stories and selected a handful as the year's most interesting and important in Genes & Cells. Follow hotlinks to the full, original stories. (p. 20)

Science News writers and editors looked back at the past year's stories and selected a handful as the year's most interesting and important in Matter & Energy. Follow hotlinks to the full, original stories. (p. 22)

Science News writers and editors looked back at the past year's stories and selected a handful as the year's most interesting and important in Life. Follow hotlinks to the full, original stories. (p. 21)

Science News writers and editors looked back at the past year's stories and selected a handful as the year's most interesting and important in Humans. Follow hotlinks to the full, original stories. (p. 18)

Science News writers and editors looked back at the past year's stories and selected a handful as the year's most interesting and important in the interface of Science & Society. Follow hotlinks to the full, original stories. (p. 19)

Science News writers and editors looked back at the past year's stories and selected a handful as the year's most interesting and important in Atom & Cosmos. Follow hotlinks to the full, original stories. (p. 16)

Science News writers and editors looked back at the past year's stories and selected a handful as the year's most interesting and important in Technology. Follow hotlinks to the full, original stories. (p. 23)

Science News writers and editors looked back at the past year's stories and selected a handful as the year's most interesting and important in Earth. Follow hotlinks to the full, original stories. (p. 26)

Science News writers and editors looked back at the past year's stories and selected a handful as the year's most interesting and important in Body & Brain. Follow hotlinks to the full, original stories. (p. 24)

Science News writers and editors looked back at the past year's stories and selected a handful as the year's most interesting and important in Nutrition. Follow hotlinks to the full, original stories. (p. 25)

Science News writers and editors looked back at the past year's stories and selected a handful as the year's most interesting and important in Numbers. Follow hotlinks to the full, original stories. (p. 27)

Science News writers and editors looked back at the past year's stories and selected a handful as the year's most interesting and important in Environment. Follow hotlinks to the full, original stories. (p. 28)

Science News writers and editors looked back at the past year's stories and selected a handful as the year's most interesting and important in Molecules. Follow hotlinks to the full, original stories. (p. 29)

Large genomic studies show body rhythms, melatonin may influence sugar levels in the blood. (p. 5)

Moving one step closer to finding the fingerprints of life in a habitable planet beyond the solar system, astronomers have for the first time detected carbon dioxide in the atmosphere of an extrasolar planet. (p. 8)

Tilt in Mars' axis could have created stair-stepped rock formations long ago. (p. 8)

New X-ray and visible-light observations of the growth of galaxy groups and clusters are offering confirming evidence for the existence of dark energy and suggest that it may resemble the cosmological constant.  (p. 9)

Astronomers report a new value for the supermassive black hole at the galaxy’s center. (p. 9)

The chemistry of minerals preserved in Australian rocks suggests tectonic activity for Earth’s earliest eon. (p. 10)

An extended field season reveals that the autumn freeze in the arctic squeezes methane from some high-latitude wetland soils, a match even for summertime methane release. (p. 10)

Gift givers expect that expensive presents will be appreciated by gift receivers more than inexpensive presents, but three new investigations suggest that that’s not the case. (p. 12)

Finding suggests modern history, not just prehistory, can leave a strong mark on a region’s genetic signature. (p. 12)

A long-term study of dolphins living off Australia’s coast finds that a small number of them, mostly females, frequently use sea sponges to forage for fish on the ocean floor. (p. 13)

Equal sausage demanded for equal paw shakes. (p. 13)

But demand for the operation, shown to guard against HIV and other infections, exceeds availability. (p. 14)

Scientists describe the shape of a protein required for conception. These new molecular details will lead to an improved understanding of how sperm and egg unite. (p. 15)

The success of two trials sets the stage for a final, large-scale trial that could mean approval of what would be the first vaccine against Malaria. (p. 15)

Decreasing breast density signals the drug tamoxifen is working in women at risk of developing breast cancer. (p. 15)

A lab study of healthy breast tissue cells shows increases in the tumor suppressor protein PTEN in the presence of soy isoflavone genistein, a compound believed to fight breast cancer. (p. 15)

(p. 31)

The Annotated Turing: A Guided Tour through Alan Turing’s Historic Paper on Computability and the Turing Machine by Charles Petzold (p. 30)

Nobel: A Century of Prize Winners by Michael Worek, ed. (p. 30)

Dyslexia, Learning, and the Brain by Roderick I. Nicolson and Angela J. Fawcett (p. 30)

Bargaining for Eden: The Fight for the Last Open Spaces in America by Stephen Trimble (p. 30)

Cranes: A Natural History of a Bird in Crisis by Janice M. Hughes (p. 30)

R.K. Pachauri, an engineer and economist by training, is director-general of The Energy and Resources Institute in New Delhi, India, and a corecipient of the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize for his role as chief of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. The IPCC periodically issues consensus reports on the science of climate change. Senior editor Janet Raloff spoke with him about changes he hopes to see from the Obama administration. (p. 32)

Book Review: Six-Legged Soldiers: Using Insects as Weapons of War by Jeffrey A. Lockwood (p. 30)

Book Review: The Lightness of Being: Mass, Ether, and the Unification of Forces by Frank Wilczek (p. 30)